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V. PUTIN AND D. MEDVEDEV – IDOLS OF “EURO-BELARUSIANS”

IISEPS questionnaires have frequently contained a question providing for a comparative analysis of the popularity of the president of Belarus and the popularity of leaders and politicians of other countries in the eyes of Belarusians. The answers to this question reveal not only the feelings of the respondents towards personalities, but also show though indirectly their attitudes towards the countries headed by the leaders, who arouse certain feelings in them. In the June 2010 poll this question was put again (Table 1).

Table 1. Dynamics of answering the question, “Who of contemporary politicians of the higher rank do you like most of all, who matches your ideal of a politician?”, % (more than one answer is possible)

Politician

04’00

09’03

03’06

06’08

06’10

A. Lukashenko

37.0

26.6

44.7

32.2

39.8

V. Putin

55.5

58.4

27.1

48.7

36.9

D. Medvedev

22.5

25.9

A. Merkel

3.7

10.7

12.8

B. Obama

12.0

F. Castro

7.7

7.9

3.9

8.0

V. Yanukovich

6.5

N. Sarkozy

4.4

6.0

S. Berlusconi

4.8

4.6

D. Cameron

2.6

D. Gribauskaite

2.2

V. Zatlers

2.0

D. Tusk

1.3

Hu Jintao

1.2

M. Ahmadinejad

1.0

H. Van Rompuy

0.8

J. Chirac

11.4

13.7

4.4

A. Blair

5.1

7.0

3.5

Yu. Timoshenko

3.2

7.5

G. Bush

5.2

4.6

5

V. Yushenko

2.0

3.3

L. Kaczynski

1.0

V. Adamkus

0.9

A. Kvasnevski

5.9

7.6

G. Schroeder

10.2

15.9

* The names of these politicians were not on the poll lists specified

Table 1 suggests that at the level of leaders’ personalities Belarus remains in the Russian mental field. Even not so prominent and perhaps not fully independent president of Russia D. Medvedev soon after taking office was furnished with a portion of warm feelings, much higher than the feelings towards other non-Russian “contestants”. And in June 2010 he together with V. Putin and A. Lukashenko ranked among the first three who had left the rivals far behind.

However the hierarchy of other rivals is also quite illustrative. It is noteworthy that in the June poll the Chancellor of Germany A. Merkel took her “legitimate” high place. Immediately upon election her rating was insignificant, but the more people learned about her, the higher was the rating aided by the background warm feelings to Germany as such. These feelings are also proved by the dynamics of the popularity of A. Merkel’s predecessor G. Schroeder. At some distance of time, whoever be the head of the German government, he or she should come in the popularity top.

Meanwhile, as regards the US leaders this rule does not work: G. Bush over the whole period of his office had the rating about 5%, whereas B. Obama in the second year of his presidency is more than twice as much popular among Belarusians as his predecessor.

What else should be noted among the peculiar facts of Table 1 is the low popularity of the leaders of the countries culturally remote from Belarus such as Iran and China as well as of the Eastern European countries. These countries are no models for Belarus. However, the relationship here is not so direct. For example, the president of Poland L. Kaczynski in 2006 poll gained rather an insignificant rating. Yet, after his tragic death the majority of respondents (57.2%) expressed the opinion that Belarus should have declared national mourning on the occasion of the death of the president of a neighbouring country and approximately 100 polish politicians, military leaders, public and state figures. But in this case such an opinion might have been motivated not so much by the sympathies with the dead Polish president, as by the scope of the disaster and feelings towards Polish nation and country.

It may be suggested that a heavy shift of warm feelings towards Russian leaders is explained by the prevalence of Pro-Russian trends in the Belarusian community. Yet, this explanation could hardly be satisfactory – according to the data of the mentioned IISEPS poll, proponents of either of the two geopolitical choices are approximately balanced in number.

It may also be suggested that the geopolitical choice, to say the least, materially affects the feelings towards Russian and non-Russian politicians. The data of Table 2 provide nutriment for thoughts about the enigma of the Belarusian soul. The idols for “Euro-Belarusians” seeking EU-membership are not leaders of the European Union, as may be assumed, but the leaders of the country, which they want to distance themselves from. Though the pride of the third place in their hierarchy of idols is given to the German Chancellor, neck and neck with D. Medvedev. Meanwhile, the US president together with his antagonist A. Lukashenko actually share the 4th-5th place. And only after the mysteriously popular barbudos of Cuba do come in the leaders of EU grand countries, i.e. France and Italy. While the leaders of Eastern European neighbours of Belarus rank somewhere closer to the bottom.

Table 2. Relation of the answers to the question “Who of contemporary politicians of the higher rank do you like most of all, who matches your ideal of a politician?” to the geopolitical preferences, %

Politician

If you had to choose between integration with Russia and European Union membership, what would you choose?

For EU-membership

For integration with Russia

DA/NA

V. Putin

32.1

44.5

32.8

D. Medvedev

21.9

33.1

21.3

A. Merkel

20.0

7.7

9.3

B. Obama

18.5

6.5

9.8

A. Lukashenko

18.1

60.1

43.1

F. Castro

10.7

6.0

7.0

N. Sarkozy

9.3

2.8

5.9

S. Berlusconi

6.4

2.1

5.6

V. Yanukovich

5.8

6.7

7.3

D. Cameron

5.1

0.9

1.4

V. Zatlers

3.4

0.5

2.0

D. Gribauskaite

3.1

1.4

1.7

D. Tusk

1.9

1.2

0.6

Hu Jintao

1.9

0.9

0.6

H. Van Rompuy

1.4

0.4

0.6

M. Ahmadinejad

0.7

1.1

1.1

Those who have abstained from the geopolitical choice and preferred a Belarus seeking neither “shore” have a similar hierarchy: the ratings of Russian leaders in this group are identical with the ratings in the group of “Euro-Belarusians”, B. Obama and A. Merkel rank among the leading five, but still the list is headed by the domestic idol.

In the group of “Belo-Russians” V. Putin and D. Medvedev also come in among the three leaders of popularity, besides, their popularity rates are 10 per cent points higher than in two other groups. However, a splitting priority in this group is given to A. Lukashenko.

Hence, the assumption made above is confirmed still partially. The geopolitical choice in favour of Europe does weaken, versus average values, warm feelings towards the Russian leaders and the Belarusian leader and strengthen warm feelings towards the leaders of the European countries. But even this choice does not change the hierarchy of assessments. Moreover, these are the Russian leaders who in this group prove to carry the palm of popularity superseding their European colleagues as well as their “bitter friend” A. Lukashenko.

The paradox of high ratings of V. Putin and D. Medvedev among pro-Europeans could hardly be explained exclusively by the fact that Belarusians know them and about them immeasurably more than about the leaders of EU-countries. This is the key factor, but, all things considered, the Russian leaders for a great part of “Euro-Belarusians” at least in terms of rhetoric, economic policy and, partially, in terms of human-rights policy are more pro-European than their home president.

The heroine of a popular song says to her idol: “I have shaped you of what I had”. In terms of media “what Belarusians had”, even highly Euro-advanced, are A. Lukashenko and V. Putin with D. Medvedev. Well, they choose out of what they have. That’s life in Europe.